President's
Message

A young ambitious salesman drove
down a country road
anxious to begin his career selling insurance. As he drove past
a farmer's home he noticed an old man standing out by his
wheat crop bent over leaning on a shovel. The young man
stopped and thought, this should be an easy sell.

As the young enthusiastic man
approached the old man, he unloaded his sales
pitch. Anxious to hear a positive response, the wise farmer looked at
the young
man without saying a word. The old man looked the salesman in the eye
and did
not say a word. Time passed and the young salesman started to get
nervous.
Surely this old man has the money. The young man started to sweat.
Finally the
old man looked the young man in the eye and said, "Do you see those
stems of
wheat, the old ones, golden and bent over?" Yes replied the salesman.
The
farmer replied, "Those are the ones with the wheat in them."

This is one of my favorite
stories. As a young man growing up on my father's
farm in Wyoming, I looked up to those farmers. Many are gone now, and I
find
myself older in life with more gray hair than I would like. There are a
lot of folks
out there who want to know about ham radio, but are intimidated by the
technical
stuff -- I was and am one of them. We need to take the time to share
what we
know. It is not only a nice thing to do, but it is essential for the
survival of ham
radio.

WA7OLY Call Sign

If you hear this in the near
future on the OARS repeaters, we'll let you in on what
it means! The Thurston County ARES RACES Unit applied for, and got, a
club
license and asked for the vanity call of WA7OLY. The last three letters
should
make it easy for other District/Region 3 and State agencies to remember
what
station is talking to them.

For over 25 years, OARS allowed
ARES/RACES to use their various calls at our
local EOC. We thank all of you in OARS for that and your continued
support of
the local emergency communications community.

NATO Group Releases Report on BPL

The Information Systems Technology
group, part of the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization's (NATO) Research and Technology Organization (RTO),
released
their report, "HF Interference, Procedures and Tools" (RTO-TR-IST-050),
in June.
This report "address[es] the concerns raised by the potential for
unintentional
radio interference to be caused by the widespread operation of
broadband
wire-line telecommunications systems."

BPL, also called Power Line
Telecommunications (PLT) in Europe, uses existing
power lines for telecommunications with data rates higher than 1 MBit
per
second. NATO said that since existing power lines were not designed for
such
transmissions, "they will cause unintentional RF emissions which may
adversely
affect the established radio noise floor directly, or by cumulative
propagation from
many such sources. The existing HF background noise possibly may be
increased via ground wave and/or sky wave propagation."

Not only could this be a problem
for Amateur Radio operators, but NATO said
that military users would be affected as well: "Increase of the
existing HF noise
floor by widespread use of PLT...will bring up problems for Military
Radio Users
as well as for HF Communication Intelligence (COMINT) in all NATO
countries.
The signal-to-noise ratio thus may be reduced for tactical and
strategic HF radio
as well as for fixed sensitive COMINT sites."

Saying that "PLT will produce the
most problems regarding HF interference," the
report makes the assertion that ambient noise levels in Europe have not
increased in the last 30 years. This was proved using measurements made
by the
ITU in the 1970s compared with noise levels today, with the report
saying that the
"ITU Recommendations for natural and man-made noise in the HF-range are
still
valid in Europe."

The NATO report said "[r]ecent
measurements carried out in Germany and Great
Britain indicated that there is no remarkable difference between these
measurements, specifically no increase of the ambient noise in quiet
rural zones within
the last 30 years. Based on these measurement results, the cumulative
interference field strengths far away from telecommunication networks
should not be
higher than -15 dBuV/m (9 kHz bandwidth) across the entire HF range, if
no
measurable increase in minimum noise levels are to be tolerated."

Conversely, some European PLT
proponents "in presentations and discussions
have argued (without being able to prove it) that ITU recommendations
based on
measurements carried out in the 1970s are no longer valid, as the
man-made
and the ambient noise levels have increased since that time to
considerable
higher values (by up to 30 dB)."

The NATO report also indicated the
following: A high probability that PLT would
cause increased noise levels at sensitive receiver sites given the
projected
market penetration; and the percentages are highly influenced by
assumptions on
transmitter EIRP (equivalent, or effective, isotropic radiated power),
PLT market
penetration and duty cycle.

ARRL Laboratory Manager Ed Hare,
W1RFI, was pleased to see the report. "The
findings described in this paper are based on good science. NATO has
concluded that protection levels well below 0 dBuV/m are needed to
prevent interference to sensitive HF operation. They studied distance
extrapolation and concluded that 40 dB/decade is not the correct factor
to use to make measurements
at one distance, and related the measured values to other distances.
They also
have advanced the state of the art and determined that the aggregate
noise from
large scale deployment of BPL will increase worldwide noise levels by
skywave
propagation."

Hare points out that NATO's report
"pretty much echoes the ARRL's pleadings
during the BPL rulemaking." The ARRL has constantly argued against the
40
dB/decade extrapolation factor that, while recommended by the FCC, the
report
found, "was not confirmed by measurements carried out by other
organizations."

The report acknowledges that there
are no commonly accepted regulatory
emission limits from PLT and recommends that countries work together to
limit
these emissions. "While it is highly desirable that the regulatory
limits on PLT
emissions be harmonized throughout the NATO countries, the RTG
recognizes
that NATO, by itself, has no regulatory authority over the emission
limits. Therefore, it is recommended that NATO seek the implementation
of this goal by
working together with the national and international regulatory
authorities."

ARRL Continues Efforts on
Interference to PAVE PAWS
Radar Sites

On August 13, the ARRL began
sending "specific mitigation reduction numbers"
to 122 repeater owners, recommending that they reduce their signal
anywhere
from 7 dB to 56 dB, according to ARRL Regulatory Information Branch
Manager
Dan Henderson, N1ND. These reductions, requested by the US Air Force
and
the Department of Defense, only concern those repeaters identified by
the DoD
as affecting the PAVE PAWS radar system.

"Some reductions are going to be
attainable," Henderson said. "You can do 7 dB,
but 56?" He said such a reduction would "not be realistic to achieve.
While many
of the affected repeater owners may not be able to achieve the required
reductions, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't try to meet the goal.
Everyone
involved needs to continue trying to meet the DoD's requirements. This
gives us
the best chance to keep as many of these machines as possible on the
air."

Henderson stressed that any order
to shut down a repeater will come from the
Federal Communications Commission, at the request of the DoD. "This
situation
only affects those repeaters on the DoD's list in Massachusetts and
California. It
does not affect the everyday, casual user of 70 cm. This is not a
wide-spread
threat to the 70 cm band."

Citing an increasing number of
interference complaints, the US Air Force has
asked the FCC to order dozens of repeater systems to either mitigate
interference to the PAVE PAWS radars or shut down. The ARRL has been
working with
the DoD to develop a plan to mitigate alleged interference from 70 cm
ham radio
repeaters to this military radar system on both coasts. According to
the DoD, the
in-band interference from Amateur Radio fixed FM voice repeaters has
increased
to an unacceptable level. PAVE PAWS radars are used for national
security
functions, including early detection of sea-launched missiles. They are
critical to
our national defense and are in use 24 hours per day, seven days per
week.

The Amateur Radio Service is a
secondary user in the 420-450 MHz (70 cm)
band, both by the Table of Frequency Allocations and the FCC Part 97
regulations. As such, Amateur Radio licensees, jointly and
individually, bear the
responsibility of mitigating or eliminating any harmful interference to
the primary
user, which in this case is the Government Radiolocation Service that
includes
the DoD PAVE PAWS systems.

FCC to Lower Vanity Call Sign Fees
September 17

The FCC will reduce the regulatory
fee to obtain or renew an Amateur Radio
vanity call sign by more than 40 percent starting September 17. In a
Report &
Order (R&O) released August 6, "Assessment and Collection of
Regulatory Fees
for Fiscal Year 2007," in MD Docket 07-81, the Commission will cut the
fee from
its current $20.80 to $11.70. This marks the lowest fee in the history
of the
current vanity call sign program. The FCC is authorized by the
Communications
Act of 1934 (as amended) to collect vanity call sign fees to recover
the costs
associated with that program. The vanity call sign fee has fluctuated
over the 11
years of the current program -- from a low of $12 to a high of $50. The
FCC says
it anticipates some 14,700 Amateur Radio vanity call sign "payment
units" or
applications during the next fiscal year, collecting $171,990 in fees
from the
program.

The vanity call sign regulatory
fee is payable not only when applying for a new
vanity call sign, but also upon renewing a vanity call sign for a new
term. The first
vanity call sign licenses issued under the current Amateur Radio vanity
call sign
program that began in 1996 came up for renewal last year. Call signs
issued prior
to 1996 are not considered vanity call signs, even if the holder was
able to
request a specific call sign.

Amateur Radio licensees may file
for renewal only within 90 days of their license
expiration date. All radio amateurs must have an FCC Registration
Number
(FRN) before filing any application with the Commission. Applicants can
obtain an
FRN by going to the ULS http://wireless.fcc.gov/uls/
and clicking on the "New
Users Register" link. You must supply your Social Security Number to
obtain an
FRN.

The ARRL VEC will process license
renewals for vanity call sign holders for a
modest fee. The service is available to ARRL members and nonmembers,
although League members pay less. Routine, non-vanity renewals continue
to be
free for ARRL members. Trustees of club stations with vanity call signs
may
renew either via the ULS or through a Club Station Call Sign
Administrator, such
as ARRL VEC.

License application and renewal
information and links to the required forms are
available on the ARRL Amateur Application Filing FAQ Web page
http://www.arrl.org/FandES/field/regulations/application-filing-faq.htm.
The FCC's
forms page http://www.fcc.gov/formpage.html
also offers the required forms.

FCC Issues Two Citations in
Longstanding Power Line
Noise Case

The Federal Communication
Commission's Dallas Field Office issued Citations
on July 25 to two utilities in a longstanding power line noise case in
Lubbock,
Texas. Bryan Edwards, W5KFT, of Lubbock, first reported the
interference
concerning the two involved utilities, Lubbock Power & Light
(LP&L) and Xcel
Energy, as early as 1994. The record shows that the FCC Dallas Field
Office
clarified the FCC rules with regard to power line noise for LP&L as
early as 1998,
and issued three letters to LP&L in 2003 and 2004. Xcel Energy was
first issued
an FCC letter in 2004.

The Citations to the Lubbock
utilities said that due to an investigation conducted
by the FCC's Dallas office on May 22-25, 2007, they found that both
LP&L and
Xcel "'caused harmful interference to the reception of amateur
communications to
amateur licensee W5KFT in Lubbock, Texas."' The FCC directed both
LP&L and
Xcel, pursuant to the Commission's Rules, to provide documents and
information
within 10 days of their respective Citations.

In its undated Response to the
FCC's Citation, LP&L stated that it "does not
admit to and specifically denies any violation of the [Communications]
Act [of
1934] or any rule pertaining thereto," but "in order to comply with
the...Citation,
the City of Lubbock files this response." As a result of the Citations
issued by the
FCC, LP&L's Response stated that representatives from "Lubbock
Power Light
met with Paul Leonard, P.E., Area Engineer with Xcel Energy to discuss
the
alleged findings regarding harmful interference to the reception of
amateur
communications by amateur licensee W5KFT in Lubbock, Texas."

Xcel's Response, submitted via
their attorney, pointed out that the Citation
acknowledges "that the source of harmful interference to amateur
licensee
W5KFT is emanating from more than one power company." Xcel also alleges
that
it "has been working with amateur W5KFT for a number of years in an
effort to
identify the source of, and a possible resolution for, the harmful
interference he is
experiencing. Xcel Energy has a good working relationship with the
licensee and
has coordinated with him on numerous occasions in attempting to resolve
his
interference problems."

Xcel goes on to assure the FCC
that it will "retain an outside technical consultant
to provide an unbiased assessment of whether the harmful interference
to
W5KFT is attributable to Xcel Energy's power system and if so, what
corrective
measures would be required." Edwards reported that on Thursday, August
30, he
received a phone call from Paul Leonard, head of Xcel Energy in West
Texas.
Edwards said he was told that Xcel has contracted with Mike Martin,
K3RFI, to
come out to Lubbock in October to work on the line noise. "Leonard said
they
tried to get LP&L to participate with them and Mike, but they
refused to do so,"
Edwards said. Martin owns and operates RFI Services, a firm dedicated
exclusively to RFI locating and training. He has been locating
interference sources for
more than 25 years, solving an average of 500 complaints a year,
according to
the ARRL Lab. Martin has also given power line interference workshops
at ARRL
Headquarters.

ARRL Lab Manager Ed Hare, W1RFI,
said, "I am pleased to see the FCC taking
a strong enforcement step in this case. It has gone on for a long time,
and this
Citation should serve to finally get things resolved. It is unfortunate
that some of
the power line cases the ARRL is handling can't be resolved without the
FCC
taking formal action, but I expect that electric utilities across the
country will now
take notice of this case."

Late

After waiting more than an hour
and a half for her date, the young lady decided
she had been stood up. She changed from her dinner dress into pajamas
and
slippers, fixed some popcorn and resigned herself to an evening of TV.

No sooner had she flopped down in
front of the TV than her doorbell rang. There
stood her date. He took one look at her and gasped. "I'm two hours
late, and
you're still not ready?"